Tolland Intermediate Students Take a Trip Back in Tolland Time

Third graders from the Tolland Intermediate School recently spent the day practicing their penmanship on slate tablets, learning how to appropriately act in public and dancing the Virginia reel.

"Tolland is a very historic town and has a lot of dedicated people trying to keep its history alive," Jennifer Olsen, the district's social studies coordinator said.

"It is important for the students to see the evolution of their town, to see the differences and the similarities between them and the children who lived here 200 years ago," Olsen said.

The third graders have been studying various aspects of Tolland history, including some of the families and children who once lived here, for several months. Throughout their special day on the green on May 26, the students went through five stations to experience to the best of their ability what it would have been like to be their age in the 1800s.

The stations included dancing and music, art and architecture, trips through the Hicks-Stearns and Old Tolland County Jail museums, and a lesson in a "one-room schoolhouse" recreated in the basement of the United Congregational Church on the green.

Editor's Note: Because of an editing error, the school listed in the original story was incorrectly identified. The story was corrected at 8 p.m., Sunday, June 5.